Targeting the critical factors that contribute to the EMT process, such as Snail, Slug and Twist1, has beneficial effects for cisplatin-based therapies (Haslehurst et al, 2012; Zhu et al, 2012), further generalizing a model that correlates the degree of cisplatin sensitivity with the EMT status of tumour tissues. The gene discussed is TWIST1; the disease is neoplasm.